<p>Vassar is a great fit, it’s just simply too close to my home town and in a location that I’m not very interested in. I think any perceptions that I may have about Vassar are likely skewed because it’s close to where I live so we have local stereotypes about it.</p>
<p>By cultural opposites I mean the collective personality of the students. Of course, this kind of generalization begs for stereotypes and exceptions to the stereotypes, but my impression of Wellesley is that it is more middleroad politically – still liberal but less activist, while Wesleyan is far into the left end of the politically correct spectrum.</p>
<p>Smith, which I would say aligns more closely with Wesleyan, is definitely academically rigorous, has excellent science opportunities and an excellent music department. I’m not familiar with what Smith may offer in neuroscience or musical theater, though.</p>
<p>I think the proximity to home issue is certainly something to think about. If you want to get out of town, or if you just dislike Poughkeepsie (who would blame you) then that’s important to pay attention to. Lots of high stats kids in Cambridge do not apply to Harvard or MIT because they want to leave town.</p>
<p>And some stereotypes are accurate, but if you also like Brown, Vassar is a pretty common runner-up. But so’s Wes.</p>
<p>You seem like a competitive candidate who might need some time to make a decision, maybe ED is not the best option for you. My daughter is in your general category of student/applicant and she will probably apply ED to Brown because it is her clear first choice and we hope she’ll get a little bump via ED.</p>
<p>If theatre opportunities are really important to you, consider that Wellesley is not a coed school, which <em>probably</em> limits their theatre productions. I do not KNOW this firsthand, so you would just want to look into it further. Wesleyan has produced some well-known theatre professionals, including Lin Manuel Miranda (In The Heights) and Kate Wetherhead (Submissions Only). </p>
<p>I agree with most posters. based on the summary of yourself, Wellesley and Wesleyan seems more less of a fit.
Schools like;Brown, Haverford, Smith, Hamilton, Franklin & Marshal does seem more of a fit for you. Even Hampshire College, would be a great choice.
Best of luck to you. </p>
<p>Also wanted to mention that if you need substantial financial aid, ED may not be the best approach because it limits your ability to negotiate offers. </p>
<p>Have you used net price calculators to confirm that you’re in the ballpark for need based aid. If you expect merit aid you’ll have to re-think your choices all together. I would mention that Smith is a good source for merit aid, especially for women in the sciences.</p>
<p>Williams is another good choice for the combination of theater/performing arts plus sciences. The environment is quite different from Wesleyan though. It probably has more overlaps with Wellesley, but in a rural setting.</p>
<p>When I lived in PA, rural PA was not known for its liberality. As someone once cracked, PA is two cities of liberals surrounded by Alabama (and I mean no offense to Alabama by that). So when I saw @ccco2018 mention F&M as a good choice for the OP, I had to investigate a little further. F&M was one of the more conservative campuses in the 60s ad 70s, as were a lot of the small LACs like Muhlenberg, Gettysburg, Ursinus, Cedar Crest, etc. College Prowler has this to say about F&M:</p>
<p>The gay scene on campus is decent for a fairly conservative campus. The girls interact with Millersville University, a larger school nearby, more so than most other students, but that results in a large dating pool. The boys tend to gravitate to townies at the three local gay or gay-friendly clubs, but dating on campus isn’t unheard of. The LGBTA (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and their Allies) is active. The LGBTA sponsors weekly discussion groups on a variety of topics, several movie nights per semester in the Allies Resource Center, and their lovely new TV/VCR/DVD player given by GALA, the Gay and Lesbian Alumni Association. Their major events are the National Coming Out Day in October and the National Day of Silence in April, one a day of celebration and the other is a day of protest. They garner several hundred signatures of support from the campus community at each event. During the Day of Silence, over a hundred students, faculty, staff, and administration participate or publicly demonstrate their support.</p>
<p>There’s more, so you might want to investigate further, OP. Just google LGBT and Franklin & Marshall. To its credit, Muhlenberg has earned attention recently for being one of Campus Pride’s top religious schools for LGBT support. So maybe things have changed at F&M, too. The world is getting to be a less violent, hateful place over the decades and centuries.</p>
<p>@jkeil911 Women’s colleges are KNOWN for being more tolerant towards the LGBT community. That’s common knowledge. If you care so much, google it.</p>
<p>OP, just do Wellesley lol. It’s a better fit for you. Wesleyan is fairly liberal as well, but women’s colleges tend to discuss LGBT issues more as have more activism on campus for the LGBT community.</p>
<p>@AnnieBeats that may be true in general, but not in this specific instance.</p>
<p>Here’s my evidence: Wesleyan uses the acronym LGBTQQI and Wellesley only uses LGBTQ, so Wes is 40% more accepting. That is just a fact, you can’t argue with it.</p>
<p>@dancingtocollege according to this article, just about every top college in the country is a great place to be gay:</p>
<p><a href=“The Lesbian Insider's Guide to 40 LGBT-Friendly College Campuses | Autostraddle”>The Lesbian Insider's Guide to 40 LGBT-Friendly College Campuses | Autostraddle;
<p>A humorous read, but sadly does not include Wes, probably because Wes students were too busy protesting something to add a review.</p>
<p>I’ll add to the others in suggesting that you consider Smith. I think you’ll find that the curriculum is no less rigorous than at Wellesley; there is grade deflation at Wellesley and the students tend to be competitive with each other, so the academic environment is somewhat different. Smith was one of two liberal arts colleges with a Rhodes Scholar this past year (a chemistry major) and ranks in the top five among all liberal arts colleges in total number of graduates going on to get a PhD, so you’ll find many serious students there. There are plenty of research opportunities in neuroscience and chemistry both during the school year and the summer (over a quarter of the science students spend the summer doing funded research on campus). Smith has some merit scholarships that include a paid research position during the school year for the first two years. They have a nice theatre program (with opportunities at Smith and the other colleges in the Five Colleges consortium) and have a lot of singing groups.</p>
<p>Wesleyan is pretty liberal and it seems that LGBT issues shouldn’t be a deciding factor here. </p>
<p>One difference between Wellesley and Smith on the one hand and Wesleyan on the other is that there is significantly less drinking/partying at the women’s colleges.</p>
<p><a href=“Wellesley Magazine |”>http://www.wellesley.edu/alumnae/wellesleymagazine/online</a></p>
<p>Look at the article on page 7 about hoop-rolling. This year it was won by a trans student, whose older sister placed second in 2011 and mother won back in the day. He rolled the family hoop. :)</p>
<p>One statistic from my time at Wesleyan is that it is very strong in the sciences. Do a visit if you haven’t already. If I remember correctly, they have one of the top funding and resources in the sciences out of all the LAC colleges according to their factsheet. Again, I have to emphasize that Wesleyan is well known as one of the most liberal schools in the country, so the LGBT thing should be a non-issue.</p>
<p>@AnnieBeats, I’m not going to “just do Wellesley, lol” because you think it’s a better fit for me. From your experience, it may be, but there is a lot you don’t know about the school or about me.
Anyway, I guess there are conflicting ideas here because each school has many of its own strengths. One thing I’ve been hearing about Wellesley that’s worrying me is that it has a competitive, more preppy atmosphere. I hope to matriculate somewhere that is competitive to get into, but I don’t want to have a competitive environment with my own classmates. I’m also concerned that there will be a lot of wealthy preppy girls there. This is a reason that I think Smith may be a good alternative to Wellesley. (I have visited Smith and loved it, actually, but I was concerned that it isn’t rigorous enough, but now I’m not sure if that is truly the case)</p>
<p>Sorry if you have already mentioned this, but: have you visited Wes and Wellesley? If not, try dropping in on a fall weekday… maybe a Thursday… and spend the weekend there. That way you can judge the weekday/class/work scene and the weekend cultural mores.</p>
<p>A good college experience can be as hard as you want it to be, OP. It’s about you, not just the college. If you go somewhere that’s not rigorous enough, make it so. ask for extra work. take grad classes nearby. donate some play time to another EC. volunteer in town at a women’s clinic. I went to Boulder and invited those faculty to push me around and they did. First week of one course, a professor asked me how much Michel Foucault I’d been reading. I didn’t even know how to spell her name. Spent the semester reading Foucault and French (gag) philosophy. Got some great LoCs out of doing this, tho, and learned a great deal about symbolic logic, Roman underwater construction techniques, Clifford Geertz, and quantum chemistry. You be the sponge. </p>
<p>@dancingtocollege You don’t have to be rude. You are asking about whether or not you should do ED to Wesleyan or Wellesley. If you don’t want any advice and if you don’t want people to give you advice, don’t make threads on here. You asked a question and I responded. Don’t get an attitude. You are still a child. </p>
<p>Forgive me if you already gave this info, but have you looked at Brandeis? I went there and it has everything you are looking for. It’s known for the sciences and incredibly strong research opportunities with world-class professors. It has a thriving theater department. It has always been LGBT friendly. Small classes with great discussions, friendly students…I could go on. </p>
<p>I have looked at Brandeis, and I do plan to apply if I do regular decision, but I wouldn’t consider it my first choice simply because of the feel of the campus. I felt like I would be happy there, but it didn’t feel like home to me. It is a fantastic school, for sure.</p>
<p>I’ve taught at Brandeis, and it is as @lauriejgs says. Almost no merit, almost all need-based aid these days. They used to be 100% need blind and proud of it, but I don’t know anymore. The Madoff fraud sent violent shivers thru Brandeis and Yeshiva’s donor and alumni networks, and that has affected FA.</p>
<p>@jkeil911 Does it bother you when students call Brandeis a low match or safety? It bothers me.</p>